Thankfully, this candidate lost decisively, but the fact that nearly 55 thousand people voted for him is disheartening.

May 7, 1945 is the date of the Nazi surrender in World War II. There are thousands of Americans who apparently wish to reverse that defeat.

From Jared Holt

Patrick Little, the neo-Nazi candidate who sought to represent California in the U.S. Senate, received 54,507 votes, giving him a dismal 1.4 percent of the popular vote and ending his chances of challenging Sen. Diane Feinstein in 2018.

A Must Read: Teachers take care of our children…sometimes at the expense of their own…

From Kelly LaLonde

There is no dignity in teaching.

We are blamed for the ills of society. We are tasked to perform miracles every day. We are told “I pay your salary, you work for me.” by parents who don’t like their kids’ grades. We are called racist, lazy, discriminatory, and overpaid. We are told over and over again that we are failing our kids.

In Indiana, teacher pay has suffered the biggest inflation-adjusted drop since the 1999-2000 school year, according to the Department of Education: Teachers now earn almost 16 percent less than they did two decades ago.

Krashen’s “voice in the wilderness” reminding us to invest in our children.

From Stephen Krashen

…until we eliminate poverty, we can do a lot to protect students from the negative impact of poverty. Children of poverty suffer from food deprivation, lack of medical care and lack of access to books, each of which effects school performance. We can invest more in food programs, improved medical care (eg school nurses), and libraries and librarians.We don’t have to worry about “improving teaching and classroom practice.” The best teaching in the world will have no effect if students are hungry, ill, and have nothing to read.

My comment for the quote below from Ed Brayton is with a quote from Carl Schurz; “My country, right or wrong; if right, to be kept right; and if wrong, to be set right.”

From Ed Brayton

Fake patriots — tribal nationalists — view any such criticism as hating America. The opposite is true. Some of us care enough about our country to demand that it do the right thing. The rest are just mindless cheerleaders for the status quo.

Public education is a public good and a public responsibility. The purpose of religious schools is the furthering of a particular set of religious principles. Giving tax dollars to religious schools is in direct conflict with the establishment clause of the first amendment. The Betsy DeVos/Mike Pence/Donald Trump quest for national vouchers is not constitutional.

From Peter Greene

…it’s not just a matter of “It’s my kid so I’ll teach her what I want to” personal freedom, because every student who gets this kind of education is one more misinformed uneducated person released into society, and that damages and diminishes us as a country. When uninformed miseducated hold jobs, or raise children of their own, or vote, bad things happen that cause problems for everybody.

The two following quotes are more than two hundred years old. They are from two of the men who founded The Republic. We should not allow public money to be spent for religious schools.

Who does not see that the same authority which can establish Christianity, in exclusion of all other Religions, may establish with the same ease any particular sect of Christians, in exclusion of all other Sects? that the same authority which can force a citizen to contribute three pence only of his property for the support of any one establishment, may force him to conform to any other establishment in all cases whatsoever?